As the goblins celebrated or practiced their new powers, Ian purchased his new terrain: Town. He paused at his creature choices. They included Human, Naga, and a race called Hasjam that he had no knowledge of. The only reason he knew Hasjam were sapient creatures was due to their placement in the creature list.

Please Choose Five Creatures:

Biota:

Newborn Black-tailed Jackrabbit

Newborn Fennec Fox

Newborn Camel

Concentrated Red Grape Seed

Barley Seed

Saguaro Cactus Seed

Warm Lichen

Dry Lichen

Fire Lichen

Newborn Human

Newborn Naga

Newborn Hasjam

….

Monsters:

Newborn Horned Jackrabbit [G-]

Newborn Stealth Lizard [G-]

Newborn Ravenous Courser [G-]

Parasitic Mesquite Tree Sapling [G-]

Spiked Cactus Sapling [G-]

Desiccating Saltbush Sapling [G]

Puffing Podaxis [G]

Death Coccidioides [D]

Parasitic Mycorrhizae [G]

….

His trepidation of having sapient creatures in his dungeon was somewhat alleviated with Mina and the rest having equivalent sapience, but the reaction of adventurers to fighting humans or dwarves worried him. That was why the possibilities of a somewhat unknown race appealed to him. If none of the adventurers knew the dungeon race was sapient, then it shouldn’t matter as long as his sapient dungeon creatures didn’t spend too much time having a chat rather than fighting them. However, as much as he had taken a look around the mountain to get a feel for the area, he focused more on the magical aspects rather than the finer details like what races inhabited the nation he saw. All he knew was there were a lot of Humans. It was completely possible that the race known as Hasjam was present and having them in his dungeon so early on would be a negative. After some thought, Ian shrugged his book spine and decided that he’d wait and see what type of adventurers entered his dungeon before creating them.

You have chosen: Newborn Hasjam, Barley Seed, Concentrated Red Grape Seed, Newborn Camel, and Parasitic Mesquite Tree Sapling [G-].

Ian wanted to see what the Hasjam looked like and experiment with the rest, but he needed to see how town creation in a dungeon went. Besides, creating a sapient baby and then leaving it while he did other stuff didn’t sit right with him. Maybe Mina and Izu would care for one after he made their house. Thoughts for later.

He created a one hundred meter by one hundred meter by ten meter box, and the terrain that appeared surprised him. No houses of the sort appeared, but the climate that appeared was semi-arid. A climate completely different from the forests that covered the floating islands.

He supposed that the ruins could be old enough for the climate in the area to change, but that wasn’t the only possibility. The fact that all the ruins were on the floating islands may indicate that whatever civilization the ruins represented may have had the ability to create floating islands and moved here. Another possibility, considering the magical nature of the mountain he would soon call his home, was either a quick change in climate due to a large increase in magic, or the floating islands had been teleported here from somewhere else. Soon after, he shook his head of these thoughts. While interesting, they weren’t important at the moment.

The semi-arid climate brought up another question: if the climate was forced into the normal climate for the civilization, would the architecture be the same? Rather than construct everything with the manipulation of mana like he normally did, he used the simple terminology of ‘make house’ to see if the architecture would be the same way.

What appeared was a house made of mud-bricks, with a central courtyard which had entrances to all rooms of the house. There was only a single entrance on the external wall leading into the house. This entrance also did not lead straight into a room, but took a ninety degree turn before entering a room. The roof itself was flat.

The first thing Ian looked for was the toilet and bath, but to his chagrin he didn’t find either of them. If they didn’t have toilets or baths, then the hypothesis of them creating floating islands was losing credence. Although, there wasn’t furniture of any kind present in the house, so this might be the most basic of examples. However, he mused, this could be the beginning of their civilization and maybe as a dungeon he would eventually be able to reach the heights of their civilization. In fact, that made a lot of sense. There were no toilets or baths, but one of his terrain options was a sewer system. He shook his head once again as unimportant thoughts took over.

Maybe if he had the goblins here to test, then his mind would stop wandering. Although his mind probably wandered because of how safe he felt as a dungeon. It was similar, but not as pronounced, as the safety he felt when reading a book with Estella as they leaned against each other. If his mind had wandered this much when dungeon diving, then he would have been dead long ago. The feeling of safety might be in part due to being cut off from the world, and he wondered if it would continue when he finally had intruders in his dungeon.

Mina and Izu had stopped celebrating and were now practicing their skills along with the rest.

Ian’s disembodied voice asked, “Are you ready to make some houses?”

They stopped their practice and quickly answered ‘Yes’, except for Narcy who was asleep and Yervin who was in the learning room.

“Can one of you wake Narcy up? I’ll go get Yervin,” said Ian

The four goblins looked at one another before Botan answered, “I can try, but none of us have come close to waking her up before.”

“I know she’s a Sleepy Goblin now and really liked sleep before, but is she really that hard to wake up?”

“We haven’t tried more forceful methods like punching her or kicking her,” replied Pugi.

“Uh, you don’t need to do that. Her waking up isn’t that important,” said Ian with slight trepidation.

As Ian responded to Pugi, she received a punch to the side from Mina, “My lord, we didn’t want to hurt Narcy, and after you introduced the respawn room, we didn’t know if you registered her as she wasn’t in the training room when you registered us.”

Ian froze for a moment glad he hadn’t done anything reckless yet, like fight them to test their powers out. He quickly created a respawn room and registered Narcy to it.

“Alright, Narcy is now registered in a respawn room, so no more worries on that front,” nervously chuckled Ian.

“What about Botan?” asked Izu, “He wasn’t there either.”

“I had him help with some plant decisions on the last floor, so I registered him then.”

Botan gave an excited nod as Izu respond with, “Okay.”

Ian also noticed the pout that formed on Mina’s face but was quickly replaced with her normal attempt at stoicism.

“Back to business. If you can’t wake her, then I’ll give it a try. Hopefully I can wake her normally, since I don’t want to order her for such a mundane thing.”

However, Ian’s attempts quickly proved futile with the only change being a louder snore than normal whenever he asked her to wake up. The well timed snores made him a bit irritable, and he wondered if she was truly asleep. After twenty minutes of attempts, he finally grew sick of it and ordered her up.

“Wake up, Narcy,” intoned Ian.

Narcy’s snore immediately stopped as she rubbed her eyes and sat up. She said no words, but unblinkingly, she stared at the space Ian’s disembodied voice came from.

“I’ll go get Yervin, so stay awake Narcy,” ordered Ian, “We’ll start making houses afterwards.”

The unblinking stare was all that answered him. With a sigh, he moved his main focus to the gym portion of the learning room.

“Yervin, we’re going to make houses now, so come along,” said Ian.

“Have you finished the other’s?” asked Yervin.

“No, but I want all of us to make the houses together.”

“Tell me when I’m the only one left, and then I’ll come.”

Ian sighed internally, this hobgoblin had too many similarities to himself. Even if it was enjoyable to be alone, completely blocking yourself off from social interaction was not a good idea. Yervin wasn’t at that level yet, but if Ian didn’t occasionally force him into social situations, then he might become that way. Admittedly when he had been forced into social situations, it was a fifty-fifty hate to enjoyed ratio. Although, most of his ‘enjoyed’ social situations had to do with Estella and the rest of his friends. That just meant Yervin had to find some friends of his own.

“You’re coming Yervin,” ordered Ian without any will behind it.

“As I’m not suddenly accepting the proposition, I assume that wasn’t an order?” Yervin asked as he rolled his eyes.

“Not yet,” responded Ian.

With a sigh, Yervin agreed and transferred to the core room.

Ian’s focus shifted back to the core room. Narcy was asleep again. God dammit.

“Ian?” spoke up Botan.

“Yes, Botan?” answered Ian.

“I feel like Narcy will be completely useless if she doesn’t wake up on her own, so how about I just carry her. When she wakes up, she can contribute.”

“Sounds fine,” replied Ian not wanting to order her to wake up again.

“If that lazy girl doesn’t have to do anything, can I go back to the learning room?” sighed Yervin.

“No, Yervin, you’re coming with the rest of us.”

“Fiiiine.”

After Ian created a transfer formation between the transfer portion of the core room and the town terrain he was working on, they all appeared near the house he had created.

“That the house?” asked Yervin.

“It looks a lot better than the cave we were sleeping in before,” smiled Izu.

Mina seemed to want to agree with him, but kept her mouth shut.

“It's not as good as a lot of the houses in the Soris Kingdom, but it'll do for now,” said Ian, “There are unfortunately no toilets or baths, so I’ll have to figure something out in regards to that.”

He could have sworn he saw Narcy’s body, that was currently hanging over Botan’s shoulder, twitch.

“You should take a walk through it and tell me what you think.”

Five walkers and one sack explored the house. After awhile, they all came back looking slightly confused.

The first to speak up was Yervin, “What was the point of that Ian, there’s nothing in there?”

“I’m not exactly an engineer or an architect, so taking liberties with designs I have no idea about may not be the best idea,” answered Ian. “Although, the dungeon system might say ‘you tried’ and let me make impossible buildings.

“Anyway, I wanted all of you to get a feel for the layout because I won’t be changing it much. Decide where you want the bedroom, toilet, bath, and other rooms. If you don’t know about room types or what kind of furniture a house needs, then ask me.”

With that Ian created four more houses as Mina and Izu would be living together in one. He could just make another if they ever ended breaking up. Although, that would probably never happen as they thoroughly enjoyed each other’s company without the biological imperative to reproduce.

In fact, he wondered why he cared about toilets as the slimes or jellies would take care of it. Although, he would have to put them on this floor first. The bath was another matter as Narcy’s unblinking stare had been more unnerving than he let on.

In regards to toilets the fourth of five actually contained one. It was a squat toilet with a hole filled with cylinders. He wasn't quite sure how it worked, but at least he knew toilets were present. After some testing, Ian discovered that he could create the same house with a toilet everytime if he simply said ‘house with toilet’. He supposed that the dungeon creation by order rather than mana manipulation was similar to the chants that mages often used. The difference being a chant with the simplification of ‘house’ or ‘house with toilet’ would never work.

With the new house creation method in mind, he attempted to create houses with baths and toilets but his attempts proved unsuccessful. When he changed up methods and switched bath with shower, a change was seen. A small room with a bucket appeared. The room didn’t fit with the layout of the house and always protruded from one of the rooms. It seemed the idea of a shower was simply dumping water on themselves.

All of Ian’s tests occurred away from the five houses that the goblins now explored with one another.

With baths not being a part of the town’s culture, it looked like he would have to make his own. If he was still human, he would have had to get designers and crafters to help him while he did the enchantments. As a dungeon his spells never disappeared, so he could do everything with magic.

Ian began his bath creation in one of the rooms of the house without a shower but with a toilet. He’d have to fix the ones without toilets that the goblins were currently exploring before he furnished them. Even if the creatures in his dungeon technically didn’t need a toilet, as they could do it anywhere with slimes and jellies present, it was better to get the habit started early. With filth concentrated in one area, it would improve hygiene and reduce the area the slimes and jellies needed to clean. When he got the Ecosystem perk at level one hundred, he might add it to the town. A functional goblin town that he didn't need to watch over would be nice. Besides, the idea of going wherever you wanted didn’t fit in a more civilized society. He wouldn’t be surprised if they eventually wanted more goblins and hobgoblins to socialize with.

Using earth and pressure magic, he created a dark brown, oval basin with the hardness of a diamond. It wasn’t the most beautiful piece, but it did its job properly. However, laying on something with the hardness of a diamond was not fun. He knew well that feeling having laid on plenty of stone dungeon floors. To mitigate that, he cast the magic he created after he started dating Estella: fluff magic.

When the woman that could punch holes in dragons and make kings cower was revealed to love stuffed animals and fluffy blankets, he’ll admit to being surprised and asking about the dissonance. All he got in response was an eye roll, a scoff, and a ‘stop being a close-minded idiot’. Feeling incredibly bad afterwards, he sincerely apologized by creating the fluff magic. He was not a stranger to the derision of others over his love of dungeons, so the fact that he had done the same to someone he loved tore at his heart. He commissioned a stuffed rabbit of which he enchanted with the same spell he would use on the bathtub. After he gave Estella the gift with an apology, they had quite the enjoyable night.

He cast the magic on the entire tub so it felt soft and fluffy but removed the part of the magic that would have physically made the tub fluffy. Being fluffy also meant absorbency, so a bad physical change for a bathtub. The fluff spell could have been an enchantment, as long as he layered it with the normal bath enchantments, but Ian had wanted to try a perpetual spell.

The enchantments that covered the tub were a combination of water, heat, dissipation, space, and activation magics. When mana was manipulated into certain points on the formation, the heat and water parts of the enchantment would activate and pour water into the bathtub. After the bathtub was filled with a certain amount of water, the enchantment would stop and bathing could now commence. Once bathing was done, points on the opposite side of the heat and water activation points would have mana manipulated into them to dissipate the water back into mana and the space magic would would clean the tub by tossing the filth into a separate dimension.

Ian completed the tub by making all the enchantments invisible with light magic except for the activation points, deactivation points, and the parts of the formation where water appeared. After his completion of the tub, a surprising notification appeared.

Treasure: ‘Durable Bathtub of Fluffiness’ Created.

+100 DP

His nonexistent eyebrows slowly rose up. He could create treasures with his magic? Also, how would this work as a treasure? Sure, the enchantments would continue out into the world, but the fluffy aspect was supported by the dungeon. However, stories of items sprang to the forefront of his mind. Items that seemed to use no mana and had no enchantment. Originally he thought it was some sort of invisibility or illusion like he used on his enchantments, but maybe it was an item infused with a spell. The fact that it didn’t consume mana bugged him to no end. The fluffy spell was consuming ambient mana currently, so what would change when someone received it as a treasure? After he got an avatar, he might have to steal some of his own items if he couldn’t take them out on his own.

With the bathtub out of the way, it was time for everyone to tell him what they wanted with their houses.

When everyone was done exploring the houses and asking him questions, he erased the current ones and added toilets. It seemed they wanted to design the rooms themselves, so all he had to do was place the furniture in the correct room.

Before he could create furniture however, he needed to know if he could do it using the terrain like he had with water in the deep cave terrain or if he would have to rely on the decoration section of the dungeon shop. A quick word of ‘table’ was all it took for Ian to start making furniture for the goblins without relying on the dungeon shop.

The houses were made up of four rooms, two large and two small rooms. The toilet took up one of the small rooms, so that left only two large rooms and one small room. Ian should have realized in the beginning there wasn’t going to be much variation in the room arrangement as very few would want their bedroom near the entrance. Thus the layout the goblins decided on was bedroom opposite of the entrance, toilet and bathroom in the two small rooms, and a ‘whatever they wanted room’ for the room the entrance led to.

He placed beds and shelves in the bedroom. Cabinets and dressers wouldn’t appear. The beds had a reed mattress, which Ian could only assume would be quite uncomfortable, so he placed the fluffy spell on them. The personal spaces got a mix of tables, chairs, couches, recliners, and desks. He cast the same fluff spell on the recliner and couch. Although, he reduced the fluffiness somewhat afraid they all might turn into a goblin like Narcy. Last but not least, he placed a bathtub into the remaining small room of each house.

They all started to organize their houses and occasionally ask Ian for a more personal items.

Izu asked for a small pond in the center of the courtyard and a couple of water elementals. A couple of tries to make a pond with his dungeon abilities later, and nothing came of it. Izu seemed disappointed, but Ian quickly shifted to simply creating a small pond with earth and water magic. It took only a couple of minutes before a small pond with five water elementals surrounding it was created. Mina seemed unsure of how to feel about the pond. She liked that Izu got to stare at something he enjoyed, but she certainly didn’t want him staring at it all the time.

Mina asked for an armor stand. Once again he was unable to create it using the functions of shaping the town terrain. Should he make one or purchase one from the dungeon shop? He could create a perfect anatomical model, well perfect for when he was human, of a goblin, but Mina wasn’t exactly a normal goblin with her height. She would need a personal armor stand, so he decided to buy one from the dungeon shop. However, first he wanted to see what making a goblin from earth got him.

It was a quick process as his understanding of goblin anatomy was quite extensive.

Treasure: ‘Earthen Goblin Statue’ Created.

+100 DP

Another treasure. He had made some assumptions about using magic in a dungeon, that might, in fact, be wrong. Otherwise, something had changed. The only thing he could think of was the ability to get dungeon functions from his created spells and enchantments. He doubted the system….oh right….the Helper.

Before he could go ask the helper about his ability to create treasures with his spells, Mina interrupted his thoughts, “My lord? I don’t believe my armor will fit this goblin statue.”

Ian snapped out of his thoughts and answered, “Right. Sorry about that Mina. The goblin was a test for something else. I’ll purchase your armor stand now.”

Ian focused on the dungeon shop and searched for ‘armor stand’.

Dungeon Shop

Human Armor Stand

100 DP

Magical Human Armor Stand

1,000 DP

Goblin Armor Stand

100 DP

Magical Goblin Armor Stand

1,000 DP

Magical Goblin Armor Stand: An armor stand than can be tied to the mana signature of a goblin individual. Once tied to an individual, the armor will shift to that individual’s body shape.

Prerequisites:

None

Just what he needed. With that a thousand DP disappeared, and an armor stand appeared in front of Mina.

“Thank you, Ian!” said Mina with a large smile on her face as she grabbed the armor stand and ran it into the house.

As he watched her go, Ian wanted to go ask the Helper his questions, but he supposed helping Narcy, Botan, Pugi, and Yervin came first.

Botan wanted a tree in the courtyard and plants in his house.

“I have two trees: the golden apple tree and a parasitic mesquite tree sapling. Which one do you want?” asked Ian. “By the way, the parasitic mesquite tree sapling is a monster.”

“The parasitic mesquite tree doesn’t have any seeds?” inquired Botan.

“No, it seems that monsters don’t have seed or spore forms like their biotic counterparts.”

“Okay, I’ll have the parasitic mesquite tree sapling in my courtyard and the rest in my house.” he said with a puffed out chest.

“The golden apple tree won’t fit in your house, so I’ll put it in the middle of the five houses. Okay?”

Botan gave Ian a nod in response.

“Actually, I’ll give you the seed, but make sure to plant it in the middle of the five houses, okay?” added Ian.

Botan’s nod was a lot more enthusiastic this time around.

Ian placed the monster sapling in the courtyard. In a similar manner to the bathtub he created plant pots with earth and pressure magic.

Treasure ‘Durable Earthen Plant Pot’ Created.

+100 DP

A total of fifteen pots were created for both biota and monsters. Ian had to plant the monsters and dangerous seeds himself, but otherwise he gave Botan seeds to plant the rest, including the new barley and grape seeds. Happily, Botan grabbed each pot and carefully planted them around the house. He hoped Botan would be careful with the ones that could kill him, but at least Ian had the peace of mind that he would respawn.

When Pugi asked him for training equipment, Ian asked, “Don’t you have the gym in the learning room?”

“I haven’t really used it yet, but according to Narcy that’s more form training techniques and following lessons with your body. It apparently doesn’t have anything to hit, just open space to train in,” she answered back.

He might need to upgrade the learning room if that was the case or purchase the training room. For now, he’d just acquiesce to her request. Unlike the tub or pots, which were pretty easy, he had to search through the dungeon shop again looking for ‘training equipment’.

Dungeon Shop

Training Dummy

1,000 DP

Dumbbell 1kg

100 DP

Punching Bag

10,000 DP

They all sounded good, so with his surplus of DP he purchased them all. However, while the training dummy and punching bag were decoration, the dumbbell was a treasure, so he would have to go into the tree menu to upgrade that.

After upgrading to a ten kilogram dumbbell, Ian gave Pugi all the dumbbell weights along with the training dummy and punching bag.

With a radiant smile on her face, she thanked Ian with a loud voice and sprinted into her house with each item.

Narcy was already asleep on her bed, so she didn’t ask anything of him. Although, when he made linen bed sheets for all of them, he made hers extra fluffy.

Yervin’s request should have been expected given his similarities to Ian.

“I want a lot of paper and writing implements, so I can write my ideas down,” Yervin bluntly stated.

“Do you even know how to read and write? And if you do, in what language?” asked Ian.

Yervin looked at him like an idiot, “The language I’m speaking in, and I can only assume I gained the knowledge from whatever gave me knowledge about books.”

Oh, right. The goblin language was auto-translated, and he had forgotten they were speaking it.

After a short pause, Ian spoke, “Okay, I’ll get you paper and writing implements.”

With his new way to create treasures, paper should be easy, although not as easy as the bathtub and pots. Writing implements on the other hand might be too complicated for him. Although….while the mechanical minutia may be beyond him at this point, the zoom feature should help with that in the future, why did he need the writing implement to be mechanically sound?

Ian converted his mana into ink and flight while imagining a goose feather perpetually dipped in ink. Exactly what he imagined fell onto to the ground in front of Yervin.

The hobgoblin leaned down and picked it up. After looking at the created item, he looked at the former direction of Ian’s voice, “I’m impressed. I knew you were good at magic, but didn’t know creating things out of thin air came so easily to you.”

“I’d normally be gloating for finally impressing you with something, but normally that would only last for less than a second before dissipating back into mana. It’s currently being supported by that vast pool of mana from the other universe,” groaned Ian. “Besides, even though I formed it through magic, it didn’t become a treasure.”

It also cost him one million mana to make that thing. Using creation to actually make a mana heart cost ten times that, but would last forever. The smallest mana heart, but still.

“Hmm, interesting,” said Yervin looking at the quill again, “Can you make the paper now?”

“Fine,” grunted Ian.

For the paper creation, he used wood, water, and heat to form a notebook. The notebook plopped onto the ground where Yervin picked it up and returned to his house. Okay, maybe he and Yervin weren’t as similar as he thought, he would never be that rude. At least he hoped.

Another failure. However, it took very little time for the difference between the bath, pots, and statue and the quill and notebook to click in his head. Ian’s core climbed down off of his pedestal and began smashing himself into the floor. After a couple of minutes, he climbed back up his pedestal and laid back down.

The quill and paper he created purely from his mana pool. The earth based treasures were formed from the dirt of the dungeon. It seemed manipulating aspects of his dungeon with spells could create treasures. An extra step that made sense. With his pure magic, he would only have to rely on his imagination to create objects of unparalleled power, although at a high mana cost. That high mana cost not being so high for him. Having to create the objects through manipulation meant they relied more on his technical skill in creating the item. He wasn’t an artist or an engineer, so most of the things he created would be barebones with poor functions.

His enchantments could mitigate some of the poor functions and poor aesthetic, but higher level enchantments needed an appropriate material to display their power. Creating treasures with his spells wasn’t nearly as powerful as he thought it was, but it was still a great boon. Now he needed to see if being able to do so was normal or not.

His vision focused back on this dungeon core and he asked a question, “Can dungeons use spells they gain to create treasures and traps?”

“Yes,” replied the Helper.

“How do dungeons other than me create traps?”

“They purchase the appropriate spell on the spell tree.”

That’s what he assumed as he had done it since the beginning, but it was good to have a baseline.

“How do dungeons other than me create treasures?” questioned Ian.

“They purchase the appropriate spell on the spell tree.” answered the Helper.

Ian didn’t know what other answer he expected.

“Can spells be used to create treasures purely through magic formation?”

Magic formation being what most called the attempts to form physical manifestations from magic for extended periods of time.

“No.”

“Can spells be used to create treasures through magic manipulation?”

Magic manipulation referring to changing the surrounding environment through magic.

“Yes.”

Good, good. Confirmation was always nice, along with denial. He supposed this is what the Helper could be used for: confirming his hypotheses about the dungeon. But only after he did tests first.

Also, now that he thought about it, his creation of enchanted treasures was a form of magic manipulation. Most didn’t consider enchantments magic manipulation as they degraded in a similar manner to magic formations, but they did manipulate how already created items worked. A small number of researchers had considered enchantments the bridge between the two to make magic formation more viable. He hadn’t been apart of any of the studies, no matter how many times they asked him, but at the time of his death there didn’t seem to be any progress.

As he started to move his vision, he remembered the biggest problem with the treasures: how did the casted spells remain on them after leaving the dungeon? He asked the Helper the question.

“I cannot answer,” monotoned the Helper.

“Will you ever be able to answer?” asked Ian.

“No.”

He didn’t know how to feel. Mad that his question wasn’t answered? Or happy that he would be able to figure it out on his own without feeling stupid for not asking the Helper? Either way, he was at least glad to know the Helper would never answer him.

Ian was pleased with the new knowledge he gained from helping them decorate their houses. Although, not having quill and paper treasures meant he would have to make the paper periodically with actual spells. Just spending mana and having them appear near instantly would be much easier. He needed to make sure he kept his voice in check, and didn’t let Yervin hear him being annoyed.

Setting up the houses only took about half a day, so he had some time left to get a floor or two in. Not a floor like he already created, but a condensed floor focused on a single idea. Meeting the floor requirements for creatures on a small floor would be much harder however.